Ratings
are based on a 1 to 5 scale
1 being the worst. 3 ... average.
5 is the highest rating

Date Reviewed - 08.19.03

DuelMonster

Tuesday:
Lava Golem:
PGD-107-Retail Secret Rare
Fire/Fiend/8/3000/2500
Effect: This monster must be Special Summoned on your
opponent’s side of the field by offering 2 monsters on
your opponent’s side of the field as a Tribute. This
card inflicts 1000 points of Direct Damage to the Life
Points of this card’s controller during each of
his/her Standby Phases. When you Special Summon this
monster, you cannot Normal Summon or Set a monster
during the same turn.

This card is kinda descent, you can create a nice
burning lock if you build a deck around it, but is it
worth being a Secret Rare?, well if you look at some
of the older Secret Rares like Thousand Dragon (which
turned starter-common), Serpent Knight Dragon,... This
card seems abit more worthy if you look at it that
way.

Now on to the burnage. Having to sacrifice your
opponents monster to summon a monster is very unique
in itself, your destroying their monsters to give them
a monster that causes them more harm. But... You can't
just throw him in a deck and expect him to help, the
trick with Lava is to make it so your opponent cannot
attack you with it or tribute it for another monster.

Leaving the only thing for them able to do is play
Dark Hole, TttD, Raigeki Break, Man-Eater Bug or
another card to destroy it, or they can even play
Creature Swap to give you some burn time instead.

The basic way to create a Lava-Lock is once you get
him on their field you have to stop them from
attacking with either stall cards like Messenger Of
Peace and Gravity Bind, or you can even use specific
monster stoppers like Spellbinding Circle, but best
yet use Mask of the Accursed or Nightmare Wheel to
deal out some extra damage every turn. Then the
hardest trick is to have a Mask Of Restrict ready but
not active until you get him out so they can't tribute
him to get him off the field. Then as I stated before
they’re left to use Monster removal M/T to destroy
him, so it's good to run some counters like IO, MJ,
MD, 7Tools, and whatnot, or they can use Exiled Force
but that's where Mask Of Restrict helps out again.

The worst thing about this monster is drawing him
early and having to wait till the opponent has enough
monster out and timing it so they won't just beat you
to death with him once you do give him to them. There
are some nice combos that can be worked with him
though. You can use Jowls of Dark Demise to attack
them then use the RoD+BBtD combo to do some massive
damage.

Lava Golem is best used in a straight Burner Deck,
which will definitely
help speed things up, but he can also be used in a
Beatdown if prepared right. If you don't mind the 1000
damage every turn or can find some way around it (2x
Solemn Wishes/Skill Drain), you can Creature Swap or
Snatch Steal him back to have a powerful 3000
attacker.

This card may not see much play at the moment but with
future releases it becomes more useable/powerful so
look out or stay tuned.

This card must be Special Summoned on your opponent's
side of the field by offering 2 monsters on your
opponent's side of the field as a Tribute. This card
inflicts 1000 points of Direct Damage to the Life
Points of this card's controller during each of
his/her Standby Phases. When you Special Summon this
monster, you cannot Normal Summon or Set a monster
during the same turn.

Pharaonic Guardian did a lot for burner decks so I
suppose this is as good a choice as any for one of the
secret rares.

This is a card that really needs a deck built around
it. It's not just something you toss into your deck to
take for a test drive. It may sound insane to give
your opponent a 3000 ATK monster, even if they lose 2
monsters in the process and under normal
circumstances, it is. But, with the much touted "Lava
Lock", you can cause all sorts of misery and pain to
your opponent. First off, let's go over how to do a
"Lava Lock":

* You have to stop it from attacking: Mask of the
Accursed, Nightmare Wheel, Spellbinding Circle, Ekibyo
Drakmord, Gravity Bind, Messenger of Peace are some
cards to do that. The first 2 will do extra damage for
you as well

* You have to keep your opponent from tributing it:
Mask of Restrict will take care of this

* Ideally, you have to stop your opponent from
removing any of the above: Imperial Order will work
well as long as you use Nightmare Wheel, Spellbinding
Circle or Gravity Bind to stop it because they are
traps

Sounds easy doesn't it? Not really. First off, you
need 3 cards in your hand, 4 if you want to do the
total lockdown. Second, your opponent has to have 2
monsters on the field. This makes for a very tough
maneuver. That doesn't mean that you shouldn't use
this if you don't have all the cards. Even without
Mask of Restrict, all they can do is tribute it.
Preventing it from attacking is more important since
you won't be able to normal summon or set a monster
when you give this to your opponent.

* Snatch Steal : Summon Lava Golem, steal it then
attack for 3000. This is a dangerous move since your
opponent will gain 1000LP and you'll lose 1000LP per
turn. Don't keep it for very long. Ring it if you can.

There are many many amusing ways of using this card.
It's not for every deck, not for most actually. It
doesn't even fit in every burner deck. It only fits in
a Lava Lock Deck in my opinion. This is a fun card
though.

Rating-
Casual: 3.7
Tourney: 2.7

vodkam

DM7FGD

Lava Golem PGD-107-Retail Secret Rare
Fire/Fiend/8/3000/2500
Effect: This monster must be Special Summoned on your
opponent’s side of the field by offering 2 monsters on
your opponent’s side of the field as a Tribute. This
card inflicts 1000 points of Direct Damage to the Life
Points of this card’s controller during each of
his/her Standby Phases. When you Special Summon this
monster, you cannot Normal Summon or Set a monster
during the same turn.

Here we have Lava Golem. A bit of an underrated card.
It does not normally see much play in the Japanese
game these days, but I really don't see why. It can be
absolutely devastating in the current Japanese game
with all there is to help w/ using Lava Golem. Not
seen too much in English decks, either nowadays.

Some cards that can help with Lava Golem in sealing
the "Lava Lockdown" are things like Nightmarte Wheel,
Mask of Restrict, SoRL, Mask of the Accursed, Gravity
Bind, etc. If you want a total "Lava Lockdown", get
Lava Golem onto the opponent's Field while you have an
Imperial Order, Mask of Restrict and Nightmare
Wheel/Mask of the Accursed handy. Not too easy to pull
off but if you can, well, you're likely to win.

Lava Golem's pretty underrated due to the fact that
most see no reason to just "give" the opponent a
3000/2500 powerhouse of a Monster. But if you have the
Lockdown cards to help Lava Golem, it's gonna hurt the
opponent more than it hurts you. Unless of course you
have an empty Field and nothing to stop the
Golem..Then it might hurt a bit.

Well, first off, you get to Sacrifice 2 of your
opponent's Monsters. The
only real way you could regret that is if one or both
of their Monsters are either of the searchers or a
Sinister Serpent, but that's not too likely to happen.
Another not-so-good thing is that you can't Normal
Summon anything during the turn you give the opponent
your Lava Golem. You can still Special Summon,
though, so it's not all bad. You can obviously use
this card with stuff like Cannon Soldier, and even LP
draining cards to do some absolutely devastating burn
damage to the opponent's LP in a mere matter of a
single turn using simply Burn tactics.

Obviously to give the opponent control of Lava Golem
and have a Magic
Cylinder, Ring of Destructon or Mirror Force set on
the Field won't make your opponent too happy either.

To answer what you may be thinking; No, it will not be
restricted/limited. Yes, it can work well in Burn
decks. And yes, the opponent can use it for tribute
for one of their Monsters. But that's not really a bad
thing. Instead of having 2 Monsters to choose from,
they'd only have 1; Lava Golem, and they'd lose at
least 1000 LP in the process.

Basically, when using Lava Golem, you just need some
things that are going to protect you from your own
Monster (Lava Golem) doing damage to you. If you can
do so, and for long enough, it could end up winning
you the duel. There are quite a few effective ways to
use Lava Golem. If you think of any ideas for it for
yourselves, just try them out and see for yourself how
you like using it. Lava Golem's one of those cards
that you'll want to try out
for yourself before just making any decisions about
it.

There's quite a bit of strategy involved with Lava
Golem, and if you can
make it work effectively and to your liking, you'll
really get to like and
see Lava Golem's real power.I don't think Lava Golem
gets as much credit as it probably deserves. This
Monster can cause so much damage in the right deck,
and can be abused pretty heavily with the right cards.
I'd give Lava Golem an all-around 3.2/5. Btw, if
anyone's curious, Lava Golem was used in the Anime by
Marik in his duel against Joey.

Copyright
2003 - Pojo.com

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